Giorgos Roupakias, the confessed murderer of antifascist rapper Pavlos Fyssas, appeared in court provocative, incongruous and cynical. “It was a simple manslaughter,” he claimed in his first testimony in public on a crucial day for the Golden Dawn trial.
He further claimed that it was Fyssas attacked him first with his fists and then he pulled a knife with the purpose to injure him in the legs.
Roupakias stunned the audience when he claimed that Fussas was stabbed in the heart because he had bent on the knife.
“In the car I had a knife. And I opened the door. If I did not have the knife, I would leave on foot. It would be the last solution because they would reach me. I had the knife. I go outside, take a step on the sidewalk, and Fyssas starts beating me with punches on my head. Holding the knife I put my hands up to protect myself. He was taller than me. I raised them to protect my head. I hit him with the knife on his legs so that he steps back. As I moved for a second strike, he had bent and I hit him in the heart.”
The judge told him that the coroner had found no traces of fight on his body therefore he could not prove that he was attacked by the victim.
Member of neo-Nazi Golden Dawn (GD) party Giorgos Roupakias had confessed the killing of Fyssas and was charged and arrested the same night on the murder, on September 17, 2013.
He was released from custody under strict conditions on March 2016 as had completed the maximum of 18 months in pretrial detention.
The murder of Fyssas on an open street in Keratsini suburb of Piraeus led to a series of other prosecutions against members of GD, in an extensive case file that includes charges against party MPs of setting up a criminal organization.
Before dying Fyssas pointed to Roupakias to police that had rushed to the spot.
In the court, Roupakias described step by step what happened six years earlier.
He claimed among others that Fyssas and his friends pulled him out of his car, that he was scared and in panic and hit the rapper because he was standing closer to him.
In his testimony, he said that he called the local GD branch leader immediately after he was taken to police station and asked him to call MP Giannis Lagos to help him with a lawyer.
Roupakias had admitted the attack but denied he knew who the victim was before attacking him.
While all those directly or indirectly involved in Fyssas’ murder try to convince the court that the murder was not organized, but it was an “accident” and randomly happened, GD leader Nikos Michaloliakos had claimed “the political responsibility” in September 2015.
For the first time since the launch of the GD trial the mother of Pavlos Fyssas was not in court, unable to listen to Roupakias describing how he killed her son.
The Golden Dawn trial started in April 2015, the huge volume of material delayed the trial as also several other cases of GD attacks were brought to justice and party – now former – MPs are being charged for establishing a criminal organization.
The trail is expected to end in 2019.
With the trial expected to end in 2019, voters abandoned the sinking Golden Dawn ship in masses with the effect the party did not manage to pass the 3% threshold and enter the Parliament in July 7th elections.
Financial problems strike another blow to the Greek neo-Nazis who cannot except their defeat and herald that they “will return to the neighborhoods and squares.”
Or rather go directly to jail.
Detailed testimonies in court by GoldenDawnWatch in Greek.
